Prologue. From Out of the Past.
The waiter showed me to my table in the hotel dining room. I ordered a glass of wine and then scanned the menu. As I made my decision about what to order the wine arrived. I sat back casually surveying my fellow diners, weighing up the possibilities. They were mostly elderly couples bent on spending their retirement money before the Grim Reaper cried "Sans everything."
I was in transit from the city to one of the areas where a very successful mining operation was underway to see that a construction of my design was being carried out according to plan. Having a few days in hand I had broken my journey at a beach resort. Perhaps I had chosen the wrong place or time of year to make the break because none of those in the hotel seemed to promise any interest or diversion for someone my age.
I was about to take the first sip of wine when suddenly my attention became riveted.
Amrah! She was sitting several tables away from mine. I sat staring, at first unable to believe the evidence of my eyes. After five years and all my vain searching, there she was looking just as lovely as she had that morning when we had said what I thought was a temporary goodbye at the airport.
After so many past disappointments in my hunt for her, at first I did not dare to believe it was her. I told myself that she was someone who looked like Amrah, but no; the dark complexion that looked like a sun tan, but as I came to know was her natural skin colour; the long raven black hair; the nose that was slightly longer than was fashionable in Australia; the more I stared the more I became convinced it was Amrah.
Her eyes that I had once found so captivating were turned away from me as she spoke to a small child sitting opposite her, so I couldn't see their intense blackness that I remembered so well. Her whole appearance was that of someone of Middle Eastern origin, and now, staring at her, in every fibre of my being I knew it must be her.
I felt the blood draining from my face and there was a buzzing noise in my head, and for a moment the world seemed to become unsteady..
"Are you ready to order sir?"
The waiter stood ready, and distractedly I managed to give my order.
For years I had sought her both in anger because she had deceived me – made a fool of me – and in love for her, the only woman I believed I had ever truly loved. Now here she was by pure chance, and I sat paralysed, unable to make a move.
Chapter 1.A Painful Memory.
As I sat there the memory of how we first met and what followed from that meeting began to play in my head like a reel of film.
I had completed my undergraduate degree in engineering, and was in the process of working for my doctorate, when I decided to give myself a break for a couple of weeks. The place I chose was a seaside town favoured mostly by well off sun seekers; not that I was well off, my accommodation being in a motel that was about the most economical it was possible to get in the town, and also some distance from the beach.
I had been there for almost a week when I met her. I was strolling along the beach one morning after taking a swim, when I came upon a woman struggling to erect a sun lounger under a beach umbrella. She was dressed – or undressed depending on your perspective - in only a brief bikini and she had a superb figure and had what at first I took to be a rich golden sun tanned complexion.
I approached her and asked, "Can I help you?"
She looked up at me with brilliant dark eyes, smiled and said, "I know it is supposed to be easy, but I just cannot get this thing to stand up." As I was later to learn, one reason why she could not cope with the lounger was that she had never had to put one up for herself. She came from a world in which servants performed such menial tasks for her.
Her voice was soft and low, and although her English was nigh on perfect, it was slightly accented and a little too precise for it to be her native language.
I don't wish to be overly romantic but I have to say that for me it was love at first sight; or perhaps more accurately it was lust at first sight, a lust that later became love. I thought I had never seen such a beautiful woman before, and when I had settled the lounger for her and she stretched out on it, the sight of her long elegant legs and the swell of her breasts under the scanty bikini top brought on an embarrassing erection that I had no way of hiding.
I noticed that she was looking at me intently, as if examining me in minute detail, and not bothering to hide her appraisal. I, having completed the task, was about to move on when she asked, "Do you live here or are you on holiday?"
"I'm just staying for a couple of weeks."
"Are you on your own?"
"Yes, I'm just giving myself a break from studies."
"Ah, and what are you studying?"
"Engineering."
"Yes, a difficult subject, is it not?"
"It is rather."
"I too am on my own; won't you join me for a while?"
I caught the flash of an engagement ring that had the biggest diamond I had ever seen surrounded by what looked like sapphires. Along with it was a thick gold wedding ring.
My immediate thought was, "If I was married to her I wouldn't let her out of my sight," but I said, "If you'd like me to."
She gave a throaty musical laugh and said, "I can promise you I would not have asked you if I did not want you to join me."
Blessing my luck I sat beside her on a striped beach towel, wondering why she had invited me and why she was on her own.
"Your husband isn't with you?" I asked.
She glanced down at her rings, smiled and said, "Yes, these do betray my marital status, do they not. No, my husband is not with me, I too am having a break, but not from studies, but it can get lonely, do you not find it so?"
"I suppose I don't mind being on my own at times," I replied.
"And this is one of those times, yet you sit with me?"
She had me stumped. What could I reply; that I found her so attractive that I couldn't resist her invitation? That the mere sight of her had given me an erection that she must have noticed since my shorts were no adequate concealment?
Trying to sound casual I replied, "It would have been rude to refuse your invitation."
"Ah, so, you sit with me merely to be polite. Polite is not honest; it is better that you be rude and say; 'No I do not want to sit with you.' Too many people are polite; I am surrounded by polite people who are only polite because they are paid to be. I do not pay you, so you do not need to be polite; be rude and go away."
Her bluntness shook me and I struggled to make a reply, finally saying, "I promise you I'm not just being polite, I thought you looked...looked... interesting and..."
"So, I am 'interesting'. I think you are still being polite – untruthful – and it is better you say, 'You are a very attractive woman, I am young, and therefore I wish to sit with you.' That is the truth, is it not?"
"Yes."
"And you do not wish to go away from me?"
"No."
"Good, then let it be so, and let us not be polite. Let us speak only what is in our hearts to say."
"Yes...yes of course."
"I am not going to be polite to you, so I tell you, I thought, 'This is a very handsome young man, he is kind and helpful, and I perceive that he finds me attractive, so I wish him to sit with me'. Does that give you pleasure?"
Again taken aback by her directness I replied, "Er...yes...yes...it does."
"Then let us see what more pleasure we can give each other."
"What did you have in mind?"
"While you enjoy looking at my face and body, you will tell me about your engineering. Why are you to be an engineer and what sort of an engineer. You see, I know that there are many sorts of engineers."
I spent the next fifteen minutes explaining why I had decided to be an engineer, and what branch of engineering I was specialising in.
When I finished she said thoughtfully, "Yes, it is good to have a profession, I sometimes wish I had one."
"You could always study to become a professional," I said.
"No, you see, if I did I would know more about something than my husband and he would not like that; he is a very proud man."
"And a bloody lucky one," I thought, mentally adding "and rich by the look of those rings,"
I said, "And you're here alone?"
"Yes, does that surprise you...yes, of course it does; many people wonder about that, especially men. But you see, my husband, he is always so busy he lets me have these times away from him; do you think that strange?"
I didn't know how to respond to that. I could hardly say, "If I was your husband I don't think I'd ever be out of your bed, let alone let you go off on your own."
As I paused trying to decide what to say she went on, "I must introduce myself; my name is Amrah Mustafic. Now you must tell me your name."
"Oh...er...I'm Anthony Essex...er...Tony."
"Tony...Tony," she spoke my name to sound like "Toony." "Yes, Tony, I like that name, but Essex, that is a place in England, is it not?"
"Yes, a county."
"And my name, do you like it?"
"Amrah; yes it's very beautiful."
"There, we like each others' names and we like to look at each other, you see how already we enjoy each other's company. But I have seen that you have been trying not to look at me while I have been quite openly looking at you."
"I thought you might not like me to stare at you."
"Now you see," she admonished, "you are being polite again and did we not agree we would not be polite with each other."
"Yes, but you see..."
"No...no, Tony Essex, it pleases me to look at you, so if it pleases you to look at me, then why do you not look?"
Again I was stumped for an answer. It was the most strange and forthright conversation I had ever had with anyone, especially a woman. As I struggled for words she once more came to my rescue.
"The day has grown hot Tony, let us go to my hotel and we can have a drink and talk some more until we can think of something further we can do – you would like that I think."
